4 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. ² After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry.

Humans can easily go 40 days without eating food. This isn’t even a miracle, just misinformation we were given that humans died after 4 days of not eating. There was an obese man who went over a year without food. You need water after 3 days or you die but it doesn’t say that he didn’t drink water. It could have been a miracle or Jesus just didn’t need food as he had enough fat to sustain him during the 40 days or Jesus got REALLY skinny during this time. The time period is the thing we should focus on as 40 is a very important and reoccurring number in the bible. The fasting itself isn’t that extraordinary.

Sin and the easy path

I have noted quite a lot during my private bible studies and sermons that sin is usually a shortcut to the good God has given us. Lust is a shortcut to the pleasure of martial sex. Cheating is a shortcut to hard work. Lying could be a shortcut to hard work, responsibility, difficulty, patience, endurance, loyalty, love, etc. Hatred is a shortcut to justice and bypasses the difficulty of understanding and forgiveness. Greed is a shortcut to earning wealth and trusting God to provide for you. Envy and theft are a shortcut to contentment and bypasses gratitude. Pride is a shortcut to earning self-worth and dignity. Idolatry is a shortcut to genuine relationship with the creator. When you can make your own god, why do you need God?

There is also this idea that I have where the sin you are most tempted with the most is the thing God designed you to be. So, for me, the greatest sins I have had were lying, sexual sin, and pride. I was made by God to be a teacher. Lying is a shortcut to knowledge. When you can make up stuff, why spend the effort to study and learn? If I can’t answer a question from a student, do I lie to protect my pride? Or do I say truthfully, “I don’t know”. God also made me to be a good father and a good husband and my sexual sin which has dominated my life was a distortion of the Godly desire he placed in me for a wife and kids. Sin is the corruption of the natural desires we have that God gave us to fulfill his purposes.

Jesus is tempted by the devil here. How could God be tempted? As we will see, they are all shortcuts to what Jesus was made for and what he needs.

³ The tempter came to him and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.”

⁴ Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

The first temptation was to break the fast God had for him and to feed himself. Humans are made to eat so the temptation was for something that he was designed for (as a human, he didn’t have this before he became human). It was a physical need, a lust of the flesh, and the devil was trying to get him to take a shortcut to food rather than obeying the Father. Should Jesus use his divine powers for selfish reasons or for others? If Jesus had made the bread here and succumb to the temptation, would Jesus be able to withstand the onslaught that will later come? Or would he have just saved himself from the cross? Jesus’s choice here shows that he is willing to suffer for the will of the Father. Jesus is showing that obedience to the Father is greater than obedience to the flesh.

⁵ Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. ⁶ “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:

“‘He will command his angels concerning you,
    and they will lift you up in their hands,
    so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”

⁷ Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

The second temptation was to show his glory to the Jews. He was brought to the temple and was told to jump off and show all of Jerusalem that he was the Messiah and that angels would even bow to his will. This sin would have been pride and was a shortcut for gaining his rightful worship as God. Jesus is the creator of the universe. He is the most glorious being that exists. Yet, that was not the purpose of this life. He was not here to seek glory or worship, even if he should have attained it, but to serve and humble himself even to the point of death.

Two interesting things about the dialogue. The devil is affirming that Jesus is the Messiah and quotes a messianic passage about him being protected. Showing that the devil knows the bible (so we should too!). He can twist the scriptures to help us justify our sin. In the same way that someone who watches cartoon porn justifies it as it isn’t “real” humans, so it isn’t lust and like the American slavers who said black people aren’t “real” people so it’s fine. 

It also shows that the devil knew who he was likely since his conception. The other interesting thing is Jesus affirms his Messiahship and Deity all in one verse. He responds with “Do not put the LORD (Yahweh) your God to the test”. Who is being tested here? Only Jesus is being tested here. Jesus is declaring that he is both Yahweh and for the devil to stop testing him. The word for test and tempt are the same in Greek so Jesus is rebuking the devil and telling him to stop the temptations.

The ultimate temptation

⁸ Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ⁹ “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”

¹⁰ Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’”

¹¹ Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.

The third temptation is the greatest. It was being given all authority and dominion over the world without having to go to the cross. God knew how much he would suffer on the cross and wanted in his flesh to avoid such a thing. The shortcut was being king over the universe without pain and death. God is the rightful ruler of all creation, so the devil used this fact to tempt him to gain that rule the quick and easy way. I can’t even imagine how much of a temptation this was. Jesus sweated blood in anxiety the night before the trial and the cross. He knew the cost. He wanted so much to avoid it. He even asked the Father to avoid the cross if it was possible. The devil gave him an out. If you just worship me, I will make you the Messiah over the world, the thing very thing he came to be! This was always the devil’s desire. His sin was pride and wanting to be in the place of God. So, God worshiping him here would be everything. Not only would it doom humans (whom the devil hates), it would put him in the place of God.

This temptation of Jesus is the reason I think the Holy Spirit inspired the author of Hebrews to write “and he was tempted in all the ways we are, and yet did not sin” (Hebrews 4:15). I can’t even imagine a greater temptation.

Finally, Jesus commanded the devil to flee, and he did which mirrors James 4:7. It is interesting that Luke and Matthew record these temptations in a different order. Luke puts the greatest in the middle. This is common with a variety of events. I will talk about this in depth in Luke 1. Was Luke the order it actually happened, or was the actual eyewitness (Matthew) of Jesus the correct order? Luke may have just been writing the order in which he received the information. Matthew may have had them in a different order to show that the greatest of his temptations was given last. Luke may have had them in this order to show that the devil wasn’t meant to put the Lord to the test. Either way, it isn’t a contradiction but a different retelling for different purposes. A contradiction would be entirely different questions/answers.

Jesus Begins to Preach

¹² When Jesus heard that John had been put in prison, he withdrew to Galilee. ¹³ Leaving Nazareth, he went and lived in Capernaum, which was by the lake in the area of Zebulun and Naphtali— ¹⁴ to fulfill what was said through the prophet Isaiah:

¹⁵ “Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali,
    the Way of the Sea, beyond the Jordan,
    Galilee of the Gentiles—
¹⁶ the people living in darkness
    have seen a great light;
on those living in the land of the shadow of death
    a light has dawned.”

¹⁷ From that time on Jesus began to preach, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

Jesus takes on the same message as John which we see as a fulfillment of Isaiah 40 and the beginning of Matthew. John made the path clear for the Messiah. He taught repentance and Jesus teaches repentance for salvation. His light is shown to us, and we can come into his kingdom on Earth and then forever with him in the next life.

Jesus Calls His First Disciples

¹⁸ As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. ¹⁹ “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will send you out to fish for people.” ²⁰ At once they left their nets and followed him.

²¹ Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father Zebedee, preparing their nets. Jesus called them, ²² and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.

I find it interesting that those who saw Jesus and were called by him, left what they were doing immediately, and went out to him. They left their careers, families (other than spouses and children) and followed after Jesus even before he had done miracles before them. They could feel the presence of God on Jesus and were attracted to him by the spirit. Pretty cool.

Jesus Heals the Sick

²³ Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people. ²⁴ News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed; and he healed them. ²⁵ Large crowds from Galilee, the Decapolis, Jerusalem, Judea and the region across the Jordan followed him.

People came to Jesus because of his healing. This only increased when he miraculously fed them. They were following Jesus for the wrong reasons and didn’t trust in him or believe in him or his words the way his true disciples did. When he gave them the hard lessons they fled and when the cross happened, even his disciples fled. Are you following God for the right reasons?